The Ides of March Bode Well for Theatre on the California Central Coast!

BroadwayWorld.com brings you theater recommendations from San Luis Obispo's own Curt Miner.

As we move beyond the Ides of March, a number of our California Central Coast theatre and live entertainment venues are taking a bit of a break as they prepare to open new shows in the near future - but there are still plenty of options to satisfy most any entertainment taste and budget!

American Dance of SLO (www.americandanceslo.com) will present Rhythms: Imagine at the Spanos Theater on Cal Poly campus March 20 & 21.

Rhythms: Imagine is the crowd-pleasing annual dance revue presented by the award winning American Dancers from American Dance of SLO. This internationally acclaimed local dance troupe promises an exciting evening of dance, theatre and music. The performance will include special guests, Deyo Dances and American Dance of SLO Alumni Dancers, and will be narrated by local celebrity Chad Stevens.

Other upcoming performances at the Cal Poly Performing Arts Center (www.pacslo.org) include the Moscow Sate Radio Symphony Orchestra on March 21, Ballroom With a Twist on March 30, and Los Lobos & Leo Kottke on April 1 (no foolin!).

Kelrik Productions (www.kelrikproductions.com) will present the Tony Award winning musical Bye Bye Birdie March 26 - April 3 for six performances only at the Spanos Theater on Cal Poly campus.

The Vagina Monologues will be presented March 26-28 at the Cuesta College Performing Arts Center (www.cuesta.edu).

The San Luis Obispo Little Theatre (www.slolittletheatre.org) is proud to present a readers' theatre presentation of Enchanted April for one performance only on March 26. And then Nagle Jackson's funny, heartwarming, and powerful Taking Leave will run April 9 - May 2.

The God Is Still Speaking Players (follow them on Facebook or at www.sloucc.org) was pleased to work with Bent Angel Productions on a staged reading of 12 Angry Men, directed by Chrys Barnes, Feb 19-21. Auditions will be held for their next production, You're A Good Man, Charlie Brown, July 19 & 20, with performances the first 2 weekends in September.

The Pewter Plough Playhouse (www.pewterploughplayhouse.org), located in Cambria, closed their production of Finishing Touches on February 28. The theatre will now be closed for a time while it installs a new fire sprinkler system - stay tuned for details on its reopening and next show!

The Houselights Theatre (www.houselightstheatre.org) completed a successful remount run of their popular summer musical Always ... Patsy Cline at the Spanos Theatre on the Cal Poly campus this past August. Stay tuned for details concerning their next show (and where it will be held - they are looking for a new place to call home ... got any suggestions?).

Up Paso Robles way, the Pioneer Players (www.pioneerplayers.org) finished a successful run of Oliver at the Templeton Performing Arts Center in January. Next up is a summer musical production of The Unsinkable Molly Brown [NOTE: this is a change from a previous announcement of a production of Fiddler on the Roof - but with the current National Tour, the performance rights were unavailable]. Auditions will be held some time in late April with performances in late June/early July - stay tuned for exact dates.

At the Clark Center (www.clarkcenter.org) in Arroyo Grande, the San Luis Chamber Orchestra takes the stage on March 21, and then The Taffetas 50's musical tribute will be presented for one night only on March 27.

In Oceano, The Great American Melodrama & Vaudeville (www.americanmelodrama.com) proudly presents the hilarious musical Lumberjacks in Love, along with a high energy 70s Las Vegas style vaudeville revue following each performance, through April 25.

The Pacific Conservatory of the Performing Arts (www.pcpa.org), the Central Coast's Resident Professional Theatre Company, located on the Allan Hancock College Campus in Santa Maria, presents two new plays in the Severson Theatre: Shipwrecked! by Donald Margulies, and Tender by Nicki Bloom (adult language/themes), through March 21. And then the musical comedy whodunit Curtains follows in the Marian Theatre April 15 - May 9 (Solvang Festival Theater June 17 - July 3).

The Allan Hancock Dance Program (www.hancockcollege.edu) will present their spring Dance Spectrum concert March 17-21 in the Marian Theatre.

The Santa Maria Civic Theatre (www.smct.org) has recently closed their production of Agatha Christie's TheMousetrap. Next up is Everybody Loves Opal, April 30 - May 22.

And hey - on top of everything else, the SLO International Film Festival (www.slofilmfest.org) is going on through March 21! Hope to see you out and about, supporting the Arts here on the Central Coast!

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About Author

Curt Miner received his degree in theatre from Northern Arizona University and has been involved in theatre, educationally and professionally, for nearly 40 years now. He is currently Pastor of the United Church of Christ in San Luis Obispo, CA (www.sloucc.org), where he founded a theatre outreach ministry known as The God Is Still Speaking Players (check them out on Facebook). Their first production was the West Coast Premiere of a new play by Gordon Greene (one of Curt's former theatre professors from back at NAU) entitled "The Scopes Monkey Trial: What Really Happened" in October of 2008. Curt and his wife of 35 years, Linda, worked together as Director and Music Director on a production of "Godspell" June 2009. The group presented a readers' theatre production of Archibald MacLeish's Tony Award and Pulitzer Prize winning play "J.B." November 2009, participated in a collaborative effort with Bent Angel Productions in a staged reading of "12 Angry Men" in February 2010, presented "You're A Good Man, Charlie Brown" the first 2 weekends of September 2010, embarked upon another collaborative effort with Bent Angel Productions of a staged reading of Dylan Thomas' "Under Milk Wood" in November 2010, presented a readers' theatre production of "The Diary of Anne Frank" the first weekend this past March, mounted a production of "Sister Amnesia's Country Western Nunsense Jamboree" the first 2 weekends of September, and presented "Celebration In Song" - a musical variety show to benefit the work of GALA and PFLAG in November. A readers' theatre presentation (possibly "Our Town") or another musical revue will be presented this coming March, with "Snoopy" (sequel to YAGMCB) on the schedule for the first 2 weekends in September. When people ask him "Why a theatre outreach ministry?" Curt tells them "I have found that theatre is sometimes able to touch a person's heart and soul more deeply than the best crafted worship experience ... that's why."